

iKi. 




15 



REVEALED from the UNKNOWN 



. . . OR . . . 



the METEORIC LAOCOON 



BY 



Ezra Cornell Monroe 



AUTHOR OF 



"Charge of Murat at Eylau" 

"The Vaudois of the Vaal, or, 
How Cronje Stood at Bay" 

"The Race in the Pantry, or, 
How Butterine Won" 

"The Heroic Goat," Etc. 



Copyright, 1904, by Ezra Cornell Monroe. 



^ 



LIBRARY of CONGRESS 
Two Copies Received 
AUG 1 1904 
^ Cooyrterrt Entry 
KAmju Xgl ino\i- 
tJLASS (V XXo. No. 

Of v a. <r 3 

' COPY B 










EZRA CORNELL MONROE. 



REVEALED FROM THE UNKNOWN 

...OR... 

THE METEORIC LAOCOON. 



BY EZRA CORNELL MONROE. 



Copyrig-ht, 1904, by Ezra Cornell Monroe. 



I am old now, yes, quite old. The stone that marks three score 
and ten, on life's eventful road, seems dim, so distant is it in the 
past ; and the greatest mystery of all that is most mysterious, I 
soon shall solve. Yet I feel no lingering dread, for I have an 
abiding faith, that some might call belief, that but a temporal 
sway is wielded by that monarch of all terrors, Death. 

It was not always thus with me, and so I pen this tale. It is 
not a fable, but the one great lesson of my otherwise most uneventful 
life.. I believe that every life contains a story that should be 
given to the world. And so I prepare for my task of love and 
duty, love of truth, for it is immortal, and duty to my fellow 
man, while yet the fire light is brightly shedding" its fitful gleam 
on a silhouette, a pyrographic panel, and on a" meteoric group ; 
all gathered beneath the menace of an ancient and rusted axe. 
These relics have grown aged in my keeping, and at my death I 
wish them buried at my side above two green and lowly mounds, 
that mark without the aid of chiseled stone, the burial of the dead. 



It was my first evening at the "Ridge". It was so called on 
account of the many hills that gradually and often most precipit- 
ously receded to the level of the distant plain, where lay a peace- 
ful little village. 

A roomy and spacious old mansion, was the "Ridge House" ; 
and romantic, indeed, with its surroundings of rustic and uncul- 
tivated lawns and hedges, Within, it was antique in every par- 



ticuiar. I was as yet scarcely thirty, but strong and robust and 
possessed of a freedom of thought, that laughed at superstition 
and rejected creeds. Many a weird and ghostly tale concerning 
the old grange the people of the neighboring village had poured 
into my ear since I had assumed my legal right, that of being 
sole heir of "Ridge Wood". "Ridge Wood Mystery", the village 
people now termed it, since the sudden and most unaccountable 
disappearance of its former occupant and owner, my aunt and her 
constant adviser and evil-faced partner in guilt, Sir Julius 
Craven. He was irreverently, but not without cause, spoken of 
by the neighboring vilagers, as "Jezabel's Craven". 

Miss Jezabel Sternhold was my father's sister and had been 
my only living relative. She had always lived a maiden lady, and 
bore our family name. It was but a few months previous, that 
both she and her adviser, Sir Julius Craven, had so suddenly and 
mysteriously disappeared. That incident dated, as near as could 
be ascertained, from the line storm of that year, a temptest of 
peculiar and never to be forgotten violence. To say the least, 
I was as much puzzled and perplexed as anyone, while in my 
heart, there dwelt a nameless unspoken dread of that incident, 
which as yet had defiel all solution. Many detectives from the 
great cities had abandoned the case without even the slightest 
clue, supposition, or even tenable theory. 

The former two occupants, Sir Julius Craven and Miss Jezabel 
Sternhold, and her supposed wealth, had disappeared as suddenly 
and effectually, as though the earth had opened and swallowed them 
up, or as if, like the elements at war, they had been spirited away 
amidst that storm, like fabled witches of old. My aunt, Miss Jezabel, 
was but little past middle life, and was said to have been as attractive 
in face and form, as she had been repellant in manner, ungracious 
in word, and regardless in deed. By extortion, had she become 
reputedly rich ; money had been her God, and she had worshiped 
it, almost with the homage of idolatry. Her silhouette, fair as dark ; 
hung in her gloomy chamber, and on its features I would often gaze 
in admiration. I had never seen my aunt, but I had often heard 
my father bitterly reproach her name, she having ruined him, and 
so caused my mother's death. I cannot recollect her, but my father, 
I well remember. He was proud of spirit and ambitious by nature. 
Grieving, he soon followed her to that land where I believe the just 
are rewarded, "The wicked cease from troubling, and the weary are 
at rest". I was thus left an orphaned and penniless child, but not 
without kind and loving friends who cared for me, until my age en- 
abled me to provide for myself. 



Years had rolled by, and now after months of diligent and un- 
ceasing search, I had been found, had established my identity, and 
taken possession of my aunt's estate, as her only living heir. Months 
had passed since my arrival at the ridge. It was now the anniver- 
sary of that awful storm, which had swept that section of the country 
the previous Spring. My day's work was done, and I was comforta- 
bly seated in the room, that had formerly been my aunt's chamber, 
but which I had now converted into a library or smoking room. My 
aunt's silhouette yet hung in its accustomed place upon the wall. All 
else had been removed. It possessed for me a strange fascination. 
Its calm and classic features turned towards the open window 
through which the rays of the setting sun now shown with ebbing 
splendor, inspired me ever with its grace and beauty. Round it a 
purple vapor seemed to cling in space, and siren music to fill the 
fragrant air. 

I gazed from its soft and most beautiful outlines, dreamily through 
the opened window that led to the veranda and thence across the 
shrub-dotted, velvety lawn to the trunk of an enormous oak that, 
buried almost to its shattered top, still stood in stern defiance of ele- 
ments and time, emerging from its grave, like the soul of a mighty 
monarch. It had at no distant date surmounted a bank some thirty 
feet above, but the work of wind and rain had undermined it, and a 
thunderbolt had no doubt precipitated it to its present condition, its 
mighty roots like the arms of an enormous octopus dragging down 
tons of earth upon its fall. It was evidently hollow at its base, for 
where its top and limbs had broken off, there showed unmistakable 
signs of a large and spacious cavity beneath. Its former appearance 
must have been grand, stately and imposing indeed, as it surmounted 
the once perpendicular bank many feet above. Its shelter had been 
easily reached, however, by a path that then ran from the veranda. 

Something of the detective is in us all, and necessity and circum- 
stance alike develope it. I fancied my aunt had often visited its 
grateful shade, and wondered if her thoughts had ever romanced 
beneath its shady boughs. Perhaps, Julius Craven had sought her 
there and wooed in vain. There seemed to be a strange affinity ex- 
isting between this monarch falling to decay and the haughty pride, 
the blossomed prime, depicted by the shadowed likeness on the wall. 

A sudden gust of wind aroused me from my meditation. A storm 
was rapidly gathering in the west. I glanced back from the window, 
to the silhouette. It swung fanned by the rising breeze. It faced 
the open window and the buried oak. As the lightning flashed from 
cloud to cloud, I fancied its expression changed as though endowed 
with life. A strange, unspeakable dread suddenly assailed me. The 



storm was now upon us. I hastened to close and make fast the win- 
dow. The wind shrieked and wailed like a lost soul; the rain fell 
in large plashing drops ; the thunder muttered omineously, and the 
distant forest sighed and moaned. An appalling darkness suddenly 
fell, for an inky cloud hung threateningly above the lawn. A sud- 
den, mighty blast of wind and rain forced open and drove back the 
window doors within my very grasp. The gust rattled and shook 
the silhouette against the wall. The picture gave three distinct taps, 
as it swung vibrating upon its cord and settled to repose. The storm 
cloud glimmered as if in answer. I shall never forget that moment. 

Suddenly, a blaze of light, illumined the storm cloud's awful 
gloom. Then a sheet of flame like a human arm and hand, long, 
bony and sinewy, darted from the bosom of its stygian darkness. 
The lurid gleaming hand, unfolded from itself a spectral axe, with 
its fiery blade raised as in covetous wrath. I heard the distant 
shriek of a woman's voice. Then the flashing blade of the phantom 
axe, parted from its shimmering helve and downward it smote the 
buried oak. I heard the lightning's sharp, distinct click, it was fol- 
lowed immediately by a deafening crash, then everything grew black 
and I realized no more. 

When I recovered consciousness, the storm had passed ; and count- 
less stars shone in upon me with their cold and trembling light. I 
slowly raised myself and looked around. As I did so, something that 
had been lying upon my prostrated form clattered to the floor. I 
reached forth my hand and touched the thing ; it was the silhouette ; 
its cord had broken. I was cold and damp, an overpowering dread 
suddenly took possession of me. With a hoarse cry, I hastily with- 
drew my hand, and staggered to my feet. In an instant I remem- 
bered all. Cold drops of rain and sweat stood upon my trembling 
frame. In a paroxysm of weakness, I yielded to a sudden terror and 
fled from that seemingly accursed spot and sought my chamber. 

The sun was high in the heavens, when it awoke me from my fit- 
ful slumbers. My first thoughts were on the incidents of the pre- 
vious night. Immediately an intense desire possessed me to view 
the spot and the possible effect, that such an unearthly scene as I had 
there witnessed might now reveal. As soon as possible, for I was 
still quite stiff and cramped from my exposure of the night before, 
I hastened to the lawn. There unscathed as it seemed, stood the 
massive protruding trunk of buried oak, defiant and grim, and as 
firmly imbedded in the soil as ever. 

I could scarcely believe my eyes. I looked again to make sure that 
I saw aright. As I did so, I stepped to the side directly facing re- 
position at the open window the previous night. Then I beheld that 



which caused my heart seemingly to stand still, and a cold, creeping, 
icy sensation to possess my being. My eyes, however, remained im- 
movably fixed. For there, burned as if by pyrography on the bark- 
less surface of the oak, I saw a long, bony, slender, sinewy arm and 
hand. Its index finger, sternly pointing in rigid directness down its 
slanting trunk, as if in guidance, and impatient at delav. From 
shoulder to tip of finger, it was some three feet in length, and the 
color of a manikin. Could ever anything more weird, unearthly, or 
uncanny be conceived ? I gazed as in a dream. At last my powers 
of volition returned, and I advanced, the better to examine this most 
startling, phenomenal imprint. The lightning's stroke had centered 
the almost perpendicular upturned trunk, and thence down through 
its hollow depths had made its way, leaving but that one, gaunt and 
ominous token of its external contact. 

I had often thought of having the buried oak, with its mass of 
earth and mould and clinging vine, removed. For many storms of 
late had seemed to have centered above its bed and menaced all sur- 
rounding objects. It was, however, not unsightly, and as the under- 
taking was no small one, the labor had been deferred. I imme- 
diately, however, set to work, and had this fire-stricken hand and 
arm removed in my presence and with the greatest care. I also gave 
orders, as soon as more urgent duties permitted, to clear away the 
debris to the bottom of the tree, and remove that also. Then, with 
my ghastly curiosity preserved in the form of a long and narrow 
panel, I returned to the house. I went straight to my aunt's chamber, 
remembering that as yet the window, which the night before I had 
left open, had not been closed. I entered, closed the window, and 
then, noticing the silhouette that was lying face downward on the 
Moor, I stooped, restored the broken cord and replaced it as before 
upon the wall. In so doing, I noticed a peculiar glint that on close 
inspection, proved to emanate from a crack within the glass at its 
upper right hand corner. It had not been there previous to the night 
before, I was certain. 

As I turned the picture, in order more fully to examine the ex- 
tent of this injury, an involuntary cry escaped me. At a certain 
angle, the light revealed in the glass an enormous flaw, an almost 
exact reproduction of the scene I had witnessed the previous night. 
There was the illumined cloud, with the lightning's long, sinewy 
arm and hand unfolding to the uplifted axe. Its blade was raised 
as in wrathful and covetous might, and poised for quick descent ; 
not, however, above the buried oak, but at the back and directly over 
the silhouette's head. In all else, it was a most startling reproduc- 
tion. The hand and arm also bore a marked resemblance to the one 



upon the oak panel. I examined the picture again, and again ; only 
at a certain angle did this wonderful light effect from the otherwise 
almost imperceptible crack become visible. 

I turned from the picture with its Sphinx-like riddle. What did 
it mean ? I was haunted by strangs misgivings, and vague fantasies. 
Try as I might, a grave apprehension, as of some approaching 
danger, oppressed me, and I could not shake it off. An indescribable 
feeling possessed me that I alone was chosen as the confident of un- 
seen agents who mightily strove, deprived of speech, to impel me 
then and there to perform some sacred duty, that was yet undone. 

Days grew into weeks, the weeks into months ; and again the an- 
niversary of "Ridge Wood Mystery" and the birth of the pyro- 
graphic hand found me seated before that grewsome relic, and the 
silhouette. The buried oak yet remained undisturbed in its appeal- 
ing grandeur. Work had been most urgent in other directions, and 
the labor of removing it and grading to the lofty bank above had 
yet remained undone. It was now twilight and rapidly becoming 
dark. Through the smoke of my cigar I listlessly watched through 
the open window the steadily appearing stars as, one by one, they 
took their places in the celestial vault. Then I gazed dreamily about 
the room. Leaning against the corner of the wall under the sil- 
houette, which hung motionless and placid as ever, rested the panel 
with its pyrographic hand and arm. Circumstances had so inter- 
twined it with this room, and its appointments, that the corner had 
been its resting place, since its creation one year ago that night. I 
had pointed it upwards, however, for in pointing downward it had 
appeared too awfully suggestive in its tragically tense and bony di- 
rectness. So pointing aloft toward the window doors, as though 
in mute witness of its ethereal birth, it had, since that time, reclined 
beneath the confirming beauty of the silhouette. I sat there hour 
after hour, a prey to melancholy reflection. At length I fell asleep. 
When I awoke the east was turning gray, but the stars had lost none 
of their twinkling splendor. I was Chilled and benumbed, from my 
long exposure to the night air, and my cramped position. In that 
half conscious state, however, that always precedes the full awaken- 
ing of one's faculties, I lingered. Not a breath of air was stirring. 

Whether it was half a dream or not, I may never know ; but of a 
sudden, the broken glass above the silhouette's head appeared to 
gleam with a never before seen brightness, although enveloped in 
deepest shadow. Once, twice, thrice, it flashed, as if in caressing 
brightness ; then the face of the silhouette shone with a pale, pas- 
sionate, phosphorescent glow. Once, twice, thrice, the picture tapped 
the wall ; then it began to sway as though endeavoring to reach the 



it 

pyrographic panel. My eyes involuntarily followed its direction. 
Great God ! The panel with its long and ghastly arm and hand, were 
responding to the summons. The hand and arm shone blood-red 
in the uncertain light. Slowly, the panel swung on its lower corner 
from out the wall, upheld by some unseen power. Noiselessly and 
glideningly it gradually approached the open window, its hand 
curved like the rampant head of a brazen serpent; and quivering, as 
does the electric needle when it greets the pole. 

I strove to wake. Was I not in the grasp of a horrid nightmare? 
I essayed to call aloud, and break the magic spell; it was in vain. 
I was incapable of movement. I could but think and see. I was as 
one in a trance, save for my brain and eyes. My eyes followed the 
every movement and direction of that hideous spectral hand, as 
though governed by magnetic flow. Its long, bony index-finger now 
pierced the open window. There it swung thrice, then it poised itself 
and remained fixed upon a glittering star. Brighter and brighter 
grew that star.. It appeared surrounded by a misty halo of light. 
Now it seemed to breathe forth fire. Nearer, more radiant and daz- 
zling, it became in its ethereal glory. It threw out snaky locks of 
flame, like an aerial Medusa ; a veritable Chimera spouting forth 
liquid fire. Now it filled the perspective with its unearthly splendor, 
and its nucleus like an enormous radium eye, barred my window 
with its lashes of flame. It glared upon me, this solar spectrum, and 
it rolled in endless kaleidoscopic colors. 

The heat was stifling. I gasped for breath. There was a roaring 
as of a thousand furnaces, accompanied with a dazzling whiteness ; 
then came a splintering, deafening crash, a lurid burst of bluish 
light that swept away all shadows, and the meteor struck the buried 
oak, and sank in blackness, sank where the ancient oak had disap- 
peared forever. In its place the mouth of an enormous yawning 
pit, belched forth a cloud of silvery smoke and ashes. They cov- 
ered lawn and house, and filled my chamber to suffocation. Invol- 
untarily I sprang to my feet ; the magic spell that had held me as in 
a trance was broken. Clutching convulsively at my throat, I rushed 
madly through the open window. I staggered across the veranda, 
striking wildly at the air. It seemed peopled with countless grin- 
ning faces that I would fain assail, but ever illusive they mockingly 
escaped my frantic blows. Round and round, midst a revolving 
cone of gleaming, fiery eyes, I now battled. Their swirl was ever 
upwards. The ground was billowing beneath my stumbling form, 
a yawning chasm whirled at my very feet. I paused, my eves grew 
dim, I reeled, grasped wildly at the air, and with one last despairing 
cry fell, prostrated on the lawn. 



12 

The occupants, not only of my house, but of the adjoining farm 
houses, were by this time thoroughly aroused and alarmed. They 
came hastening to the scene. I was quickly restored to conscious- 
ness, and with the assembled throng, soon found myself gazing down 
into the pit that marked the meteor's course, and the site where once 
had stood the buried oak. The smell of burnt wood pervaded every- 
thing, and puffs of thin, white smoke yet rose from out its blackened 
depth, and clung lazily above the heated ground. A voice from 
amongst the crowd cried out, "Mr. Sternhold ! heaven has sent you 
a fortune. That meteor is worth five dollars a pound, and the soft 
dry ground and burning wood has without doubt prevented it from 
bursting, by being cooled too quickly ; so it must be of enormous 
size and value." "Let's dig it out !" came from a dozen voices almost 
simultaneously. "If it weighs an ounce, it will weigh over half a' 
ton !" spoke up the excited voice of the village coroner, who was a 
man well posted in scientific facts. 

Shovels were quickly brought, and under many eager hands, the 
large mound rapidly began to disappear. Suddenly, with a cry of 
horror, a workman dropped his shovel, and speechless stood point- 
ing to what at first appeared to be a roll of cloth, clinging to a frag- 
ment of splintered wood. We all gathered round. There, protrud- 
ing from the ground, was a human arm grasping a rusty woodman's 
axe. "Men (it was the coroner again who spoke), take away that 
dirt most carefully." The body was found to be lying on its left side, 
face downward. As the ground fell away, the body sank back, re- 
vealing its full features, which were quite well preserved. A silence 
fell upon us all. Then a dozen voices hoarsely whispered, "Julius 
Craven !" Carefully the corpse was removed and laid upon the lawn. 
Then the coroner's voice again broke the silence. "We must inves- 
tigate still further, men ; I will assume direction ; continue with the 
removal of that mound and use all care." 

Scarcely a score more of shovelfulls had been cast aside, when 
again a workman stopped and pointed tremblingly. As before a 
mass of cloth was seen protruding from the ground. Carefully, even 
tenderly, we removed the clinging marl. It was the body of a 
woman, lying face downward ; her arms encircling, and her hands 
convulsively clutching an iron bound box. 

Reverently we removed her clinging grasp, the coroner noting as 
before the minutest detail. Not one among us but knew too well the 
identity of that corpse, long before its features were revealed ; and as 
we gently bore her to the sheltering canvas that veiled the other 
form, we were not shocked, for the features of Jezabel Sternhold, 
though dark as a silhouette's, were yet fair to look upon. The chest 



i3 

was partly open and: it contained the gold and jewels that had been 
her fortune. Despite these most gruesome discoveries, and their 
diversion from our former quest, we decided to resume our previous 
task, and unearth our guiding star that fragment of chaotic worlds, 
whose earth-bound course had proved a revelation from the vast 
unknown. Nor had we far or long to seek. 

Reposing in darkness, caused by its own volcanic heat, apart from 
any clinging debris, the meteor rested in inert majesty, rested upon 
a few charred roots, all that remained of the once mighty oak. As 
the walls of its self-made cavern baked to a brick like clay crumbled 
and fell in powder-like dust at its base, a dozed shovels dropped from 
twice as many nerveless hands. And there, silent and motionless 
as the dead, we stood in reverential pause. The climax had come, 
•we were all thrilled, startled and yet hushed. Not a rough and sight- 
less mass of chaotic matter, burst upon our eager vision, but an 
enormous, intertwining, labyrinth of metallic iron shot its bright and 
life-like substance into being. Slowly, its every detail burned in- 
sidiously its way into our powers of understanding. 

We gazed in reverential amazement, and silent awe, upon a group 
of figures that would have honored the chisels of a Praxitiles, or an 
Angelo. A human group so wild and rugged in its awful grandeur, 
that it became more than life-like ; it was supernatural. There stood 
a man clutching an axe, which was uplifted above a female form 
that grasped an iron box. Both stood beneath a mighty oak, above 
which a thunder bolt in bold relief was being hurled upon the up- 
lifted axe. It was an elegy in moulded metal, this "Metoric 
Laocoon". 

All saw a mystery revealed as by a miracle. The woman had stolen 
noiselessly from her chamber, crossed the veranda, and ascended 
the bank by means of the old time path. Stealthly a masculine form 
glides in pursuit, as pitiless as the storm. It keeps in the deepest 
shadows, from whence the covetous gleam of a woodman's axe, 
flashes without bidding. The woman darts beneath the branches, 
and approaches the trunk of the hollow oak. A storm cloud hangs 
threateningly over all. The woman stoops, and takes from a con- 
cealed cavity in the oak's trunk a treasure box. The man rushes 
forward and swings aloft his glittering axe. The woman raises her 
face, and gives that wild shriek which I had heard that never to be 
forgotten night, before the lightning burned its pyrographic arm. 
The woman's cry is an appeal for aid, and it is recorded ; the spirit 
of the storm cloud harkens to her wail. As the bright and murder- 
ous steel pauses for its descent, as though in defiant invitation, the 
avenging thunderbolt is launched as upon an Ajax. It strikes the 



14 

descending blade, and invests with its deathly current both axe and 
man, treasure and victim. The would-be murderer and his sup- 
plicant are each a corpse. They had been inseparable through life, 
both in vice and crime ; they met one and the same death ; and were 
destined for a common burial. For beneath the awful impact of that 
bolt, the old oak totters on its crumbling bank ; the bank gives way, 
and with a roar, that was only drowned by the awful rending of that 
reverberating shock, the scene sank and was buried beneath an aval- 
anch of soil. 

Not a clue, not a trace, remained of that awful tragedy, that God 
alone had witnessed. The rain descended and made firm the earth, 
and removed all marks of recent burial. When search was made, 
the appearance of the scene was as though it had been thus for years. 

I have told you the story of my life's conversion, the unraveling 
of "Ridge Wood Mystery" by the "Meteoric Laocoon". No more 
of interest remains for me to tell ; I have finished my task, and it is 
well. My chamber is enveloped in gloom, for the embers on its 
hearth stone are fast becoming cold. The meteor's form is hardly 
discernible in its corner ; the silhouette has faded on its wall, and 
the pyrographic hand and arm are scarcely visible beneath the wood- 
man's axe. Each has fulfilled its earthly mission between the two 
eternities, and their forms to me seem sacred. Ever will they remain 
my conpanions ; our work is done ; we rest from our labors. 



The End. 



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